Excerpts from “El golpe posmoderno. 15 lecciones para el futuro de la democracia”, a book by Daniel Gascón, 20018, Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial. The defense of the Catalan process from a leftist position requires some chutzpah. Catalonia is not an oppressed region. It represents one fifth of Spanish GDP, about 16% of population, and its […]
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Standing up to the abhorrent
Photo by Simon Migaj on Unsplash Originally published in Spanish: «Hacer frente a lo aborrecible». Soledad Gallego-Díaz. El País. 20th May 2018 Putting the rules of democracy in peril, constantly blurring them, is a risky game being played eagerly in all too many places in the European Union. The political propaganda that attempts to control collective attitudes by […]
The party is over: the end of nationalist consensus
Photo by Giammarco Boscaro on Unsplash Originally published in Spanish: «La fiesta ha terminado: el fin del consenso nacionalista». Jorge San Miguel. Letras Libres. 18th May 2018 We must place in the right place the “invented tradition” of the 131 presidents of the Catalan Generalitat: with stories like those by Robert Howard or Tolkien. There’s been some controversy […]
The Independence process has cost Catalonia up to two tenths of a point of GDP
Originally published in Spanish. «El ‘procés’ ha costado a Cataluña hasta dos décimas de PIB». Manuel Alejandro Hidalgo Pérez. Contexto Económico. 20th May 2018 Last December I did some simple estimations of the potential impact that the independence process could have on the Catalan economy. The result was clear: the cost was, roughly, one tenth […]
Atavistic Reflections
Photo by Talgat Baizrahmanov on Unsplash Originally published in Spanish: “Reflejos atávicos”. Manuel Arias Maldonado. El Mundo. 19th May 2018 In his shocking profile of the new president of the Catalan government, the German journalist Thomas Urban has provided a valuable service of conceptual clarification. According to what we can read in the pages of Süddeutsche Zeitung, Torra’s “alleged […]
Nationalism in front of the mirror
Photo by Ryoji Iwata on Unsplash Originally published in Spanish. ´Nacionalismo ante el espejo´.Vigilis. Crónicas de un mundo feliz. 15th May 2018 Thanks to the new Catalan regional president, I believe we are now ready to remove the sticker with the word “culture” and let breathe the word “race” that was euphemistically hiding behind. Because all fragmenting nationalist movements […]
The Puigdemont plan: summer election or autumn election
Photo by Denny Müller on Unsplash Originally published in Spanish: “El plan de Puigdemont: elecciones en verano o elecciones en otoño”. Ignacio Varela. El Confidencial. 7th May 2018 Carles Puigdemont knows he will never again be President of Catalonia. He has realised that what awaits him over the next few years is either a Spanish prison […]
The lie about Catalonia’s 131 presidents.
Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash Originally published in Spanish. ‘La mentira de los 131 presidentes de la Generalitat’ Patricia R. Blanco. El País. 20th May 2018 Quim Torra is the tenth Catalan president, an office created in 1931, not in 1359 as nationalist story tells. Almost all of Spanish media have assumed that Quim Torra is the 131st […]
Chapter Three: «A bid for the plebiscite»
Excerpts from “El golpe posmoderno. 15 lecciones para el futuro de la democracia”, a book by Daniel Gascón, 20018, Penguin Random House Grupo Editorial. “This is not about independence, but democracy” was a slogan frequently repeated by the independentists. And it was true in a sense, but not in the sense they meant it. The main […]
Torra and why words matter
Photo by Nicole Mason on Unsplash Originally published in Spanish. ‘Torra y el valor de las palabras’ José Andrés Rojo. El País. 22nd May 2018 Everything’s moving very quickly. We had hardly had time to take in the new Catalan president’s impressive collection of publicly exhibited xenophobic ideas when the race started to make gestures that could only be […]